Locus Map Does Not Run Since Device Update to Android 4.4.2 KitKat

12.3.2014voldapet Blog

Problem

After upgrade on Android 4.4.2 Locus Map does not run correctly – crashes or does not run either.

Explanation

Unfortunately, Android 4.4.2 has a new feature that prevents all installed applications from writing data on external SD card. Locus Map cannot correctly store and read your maps, points or tracks if they are stored on SD card. For this reason Locus Map is not able to start.

Who is involved

Current Locus Map users are affected (issue does not affect new users)

Navigate to the internal memory (often marked as sdcard0) and Paste Locus folder

Paste Locus folder on internal storage

Check that process was successful and you can see all Locus Map data on internal storage

Pull out the external SDcard from phone and connect it to your notebook or desktop computer

Rename Locus folder on SDcard

Remove (or rename for safety) Locus folder on the external SDcard. The goal is to have only one Locus folder that is located in internal storage.

B. Move Locus app and maps into a private folder on SDcard

Every app on Android has its own special folder on SDcard in which only this app can write. So it seems to be the best solution how to place maps on SDcard on KitKat. But Locus (in default) does not use it because there are two main weaknesses:

All content of this folder will be automatically deleted when you uninstall Locus Map. So all your maps will be deleted when you decide to uninstall Locus app.

Locus Map Free and Locus Map Pro can not share data because every app has seperate folder app

Anyway, if you decide to use this method, follow this procedure:

Open Locus > Menu > Settings >Miscellaneous >Set Root directory

Select path which contains “menion.android.locus.xxxx”

Confirm and close Locus Map

Connect SD card to a PC and move whole “Locus” folder to the directory defined in previous step

Why Locus developers didn’t fix it?

Every application can create its own package-specific directories on SD card and use it for writing own data – see point B. Unfortunately there are more reasons why this solution is not suitable for Locus app:

Locus Map has more than one version and every version has special package name (it has to be), which means every version will have its own unique directory.

These directories are automatically removed after un-installation of Locus app. This is not convenient in case you have GBytes of map files.

Hi,
I’m not Android developer, but AFAIK there are already available applications (non-system, not-rooted) which are able to write (delete, rename) files on external SD card. Hope you will investigate in this ‘issue’ to find some solution for Locus to work again with SD card.

BTW: no problems with Locus moved to internal storage so far (on Galaxy Note 3, KitKat).

Hi,
can you give me please some example, please? We’d like to solve it, so every idea is welcome. Maybe additional note: Application can save data into private folder managed by Android system. But this is not applicable to Locus because we need/want to have data in folder called Locus.